A Sea of Change

Not one to order surf n’ turf, I surprised myself when I recommended that for Friday dinner. Gay agreed and I grilled a lobster tail and porterhouse steak, both season with Greek inspired herbs and spices. A block party was planned for Saturday and we decided to make potato salad, deviled eggs, cookies, smoked salmon, smoke cheddar cheese and grilled Italian seasoned chicken. Rain cancelled the party but the grandkids came over and helped us consume the food. They, also, got the benefit of eating some baby back ribs I had smoked and grilled just for me. For Mother’s day I gave my wife the option of choosing whatever she wanted to eat. Instead, she gave me the challenge of cooking something new and different. It had to be for the first time. Technically, changing a single ingredient creates a different taste and therefore a different dish. However, I took the challenge seriously and the result was three new dishes; a roasted cherry tomato salad with Italian dressing, lamb meatballs with kasseri cheese and pistachios served with yogurt, cucumber and mint dipping sauce, and Italian seasoned fried chicken. The recipe of the week was a very difficult choice since the lamb meatballs were fashioned as a Turkish dish and I have done very few if any of those. Moreover, the flavors derived from combining earthy spices cumin, coriander, nutmeg, cinnamon and more) with mint and pistachios was amazing. However, the number of ingredients is an astounding 22 items (although, it would give your spice rack a workout). I have instead chosen the Roasted Tomato Salad with Italian dressing. Enjoy!

Change

Sunday morning greeted us with the news of Scott Thompson’s resignation as the CEO of Yahoo. The decision was very important to the honor of the company and to the IP community as a whole. Résumé inflation should never be an acceptable practice and when it is the leader of the company that demonstrates such a lack of integrity or negligence, it must be corrected. I understand that this episode was leveraged by some of the major investors to push for previously desired changes to the board along with his resignation. And we all know Yahoo is on the ropes as it attempts to maintain any significant mindshare in the Internet community. Though, Yahoo has been my home page for 20 years and is my one and only personnel email account (byrd_david@yahoo.com), it has become increasingly irrelevant as Google, Facebook and others bring about a sea of change and innovation to the Internet.

Yahoo’s future is now even more uncertain as in addition to Thompson, five board members were also asked to leave. While the easy way out would have been to hunker down and weather the storm, the company’s integrity and management team leadership would have been seriously undermined.

Yahoo requires more than restructuring and improved brand management. For Yahoo to be successful, they must become relevant again. That means the development of a vision which can revamp the service and products of the company. It will necessitate a couple of brilliant acquisitions and or partnerships to introduce imperative innovation and excitement.

I do not applaud the methods of Third Point but in this case, the issue driving the changes demanded correction.